In the News: Tory Reads, Male Retorts

In Russia, reverence but no national mourning for Solzhenitsyn: does his work “still resonate in a Russia that is far different from the Soviet Union it replaced”? * The author Tao Lin is selling ten-per-cent shares of the royalties for an unfinished novel on his blog. * The trial of a bookstore owner in Ann Arbor, Michigan, accused of bribing heroin addicts to steal textbooks from rival shops, begins this week. * At the top of the official Tory reading list this summer: “Nudge,” by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein. * The legendary French bookseller and collector Pierre Berès, whom competitors referred to as a “seduction machine” (of both women and rare imprints, apparently), has died. * Here kitty, kitty: the genius behind the Web site GarfieldminusGarfield.net, which posts the “Garfield” comic strip with all the characters but Jon Arbuckle removed, has landed a book deal. * Warner Bros. has obtained the film rights to “Drink, Play, F@#K,” a “comedic male retort” to Elizabeth Gilbert’s bestselling memoir “Eat, Pray, Love.”

The New Yorker offers a signature blend of news, culture, and the arts. It has been published since February 21, 1925.